


Belief System

by Severina



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tamingthemuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-30
Updated: 2012-09-30
Packaged: 2017-11-15 08:17:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/525130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s the kind of day he always liked best, back before the world went to shit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Belief System

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's tamingthemuse, for the prompt 'all soul's day'
> 
> * * *

It’s the kind of day he always liked best, back before the world went to shit. All the heat of summer burned off like it never existed, ‘til it’s almost hard to imagine there was ever a time when your shirt was stuck to your skin within two minutes of hauling your ass out of bed. On a day like this, when the air is crisp and cool, he liked to stay out hunting for a week at a time, sometimes more. Just bundle up and sleep under the stars, pillow his head on his hands and watch his breath coat the air. Sometimes a little Southern Comfort to keep him warm, but usually not. Usually just him and the universe, and a fire burning low, and the howling of the coyotes in the distance. Pick up the trail when the sun comes up, slow and easy, and taking down a buck meant he ate good for a month. Back before the world went to shit.

But the world did go to shit.

Daryl turns in a slow circle, his breath coming in short bursts, adrenaline still rocketing through his system. The herd came in fast, moving in on them moments after T-Dog gave the signal, and his focus had narrowed down to _shoot_ and _slash_ and _protect_. And now they’re down, the last one flailing and spitting and dying on the end of Maggie’s knife, and he takes a breath and does a quick count of his people. Rick standing over Carl, assuring himself that the kid is alright, Lori clutching her stomach beside him, face pale. Maggie and Glenn, heads close together. T-Dog scrambling down the tree. Hershel. And Beth… 

He eats up the distance between them, ain’t even aware he’s moving until his hand comes up to connect hard with her shoulder. 

“You crazy? You wanna get infected?”

He pushes her away without a second thought, ignores the way her big blue eyes widen when she stumbles back, nearly falls. Probably nobody never laid a hand on her a day in her life. Probably somebody ought’ve. 

Her eyes dart between him and the walker she’d been bending over. “I just wanted to close his eyes.”

Daryl can’t remember many times he’s been rendered speechless. Once, maybe, when Merle came home from the hospital and headed straight to the fridge, downed a beer like it was any other day, and then told him flatly that their Ma had died, the cancer that’d been eating at her finally winning. Daryl was only seven, but he remembers blinking and looking down the tunnel that his life would become without her; remembers the engine grease under Merle’s nails and the sour smell of his own sweat and the click of the remote as Merle turned on Jeopardy, the squeal of the springs on the old sofa as Merle settled in with a second beer propped between his legs and Daryl couldn’t speak, couldn’t say a thing.

“Beth, honey—“

“I can’t help it,” Beth says quickly. “I feel sorry for them, Daddy. It’s not their fault! They’re stuck here, like the souls in purgatory. Maybe if we pray for them—“

Daryl huffs out a breath, turns away and begins gathering up his arrows, concentrates on making sure the dead are staying dead this time. Hershel and Beth’s voices fade to buzzing in his ears. 

Sometimes, on those hunting trips when Merle stayed at home, when his old man was on a bender or holed up with some whore in town, when it was just him and the stars, he could believe that God had a plan. That even though his life kicked him in the balls more often than not, there was maybe a reason for it all. He could close his eyes and sometimes still hear his ma’s voice reading the psalms, her hand stroking his long hair back from his face, her voice lulling him to sleep and making all the pains go away. It was easier to believe then, back before the world went to shit.

But the world did go to shit. 

And now he knows that God is just one twisted fuck.


End file.
